One of the keys to a high-level essay is the variety of your style. You will see here that higher level of English does not always mean more sophisticated.
You could play on the type of sentences. Your phrase could be either declarative, interrogative, exclamatory, or imperative to give an order. But you are not emailing a dear friend here.
To write your PTE essay, you should favour the declarative ones, which are the kind you are reading right now.
We saw in a previous article called How To Get 2 out of 2 In PTE Write Essay Grammar that you need to reach a high level of grammar and vocabulary because computers will be looking for complex phrasing with a well-spelt variety of words.
A good level of writing should read easily. When you talk, you naturally resort to a various length of sentences to make your point clearer. You should then do the same in your essay.
Let’s first master the most challenging part.
Complex sentencing, and further
Do you remember how to write a complex sentence? First, an independent clause implies a regular basic sentence:
A subject (S) + a verb (V) + direct object or complement (O)
This structure does not need anything more to mean something and to respect English grammar, whereas a subordinate clause cannot be complete on its own. This is why it is also called a dependent clause.
A complex sentence requires an independent clause linked with one or several subordinate ones, thanks to different kinds of linking words. If you are unaware of what I am talking about, check our article about it.
These connecting terms define what kind of dependent clauses you are dealing with, and how to build the whole sentence.
When you notice, between two parts of a phrase:
a relative pronoun, such as “that”, “which”, “whose”… It refers to a preceding noun or a group of it. In this case, you are facing a dependent adjective clause, since it specifies or modifies the noun of the independent part.
This is the time that she leaves for school.
a subordinating conjunction that acts on a verb, an adjective or an adverb of the main clause: “if”, “because”, “since”, “than”, “although”…
This family always watches the news, while eating.
a marker usually introduces a noun clause. These types of grammatical constructions act like nouns, which involve functions like a subject or a direct object. These markers count among them:
wh-word such as:
“whenever”,
“whatever”,
“why”,
and also “how”,
“that”…
It all depends on the function of the dependent clause in regards to the main one.
I don’t know who is knocking at the door.
Since some markers work with different kind of subordinate clauses, try to notice some verbs that are often followed by noun clause: “know”, “say”, “tell”, “understand”, “order”…
You also find them in case of indirect questions.
I was wondering when you would arrive.
Favour a variety of speech
It implies changing the length and the structure of your sentences to render your essay more pleasant and readable.
It counts in this PTE exercise’s score globally, since it enables you to make your point sharper. More precisely, the 2 points for the “General linguistic range” include this skill.
Indeed, it is not because you know how to build complex sentences you should only write these.
A lack of variety tends to diminish your phrasing impact. In the end, you may not seem to speak English as well as required by PTE standards.
When you alternate short and long phrases, the reading of your essay becomes more fluent. It makes it more exciting, less boring.
To get there, you need to aim at more effective writing.
How to write short sentences
Trimming your phrases can help you and your reader. When you resort to fewer words to make your point, it enables your essay to be more efficient. It could help you focus your argument.
- Remove any redundancies: I cannot stretch enough how important it is. This mistake will render your writing weak and unimaginative.
A dark night
The shining sun
- You can try to use as few adjectives as possible. It may sometimes lighten your writing and push you to explain yourself more precisely.
- Now that you trained to write in a more sophisticated way, you can allow yourself to go simpler from time to time. It means you can replace some wordy expressions by their more standard alternatives. Hence:
Due to this dire situation that… becomes because!
- Try to go straight to the point by avoiding “this is” or “there are”, and putting a pronoun in their place.
There are some situations that are difficult.
Some situations are difficult.
Concise writing is a powerful tool of persuasion, which will score you point if you know when to use or to avoid it.
- Finally, you may write well, but it is challenging to accomplish all this and give your best in one draft. Keeping a bit of time before the imparted 20 minutes end is primordial to proofread your essay. We all make basic errors before reviewing our writing.
One last tip to leave you with:
It is common to miss some mistakes we make because we are too close to our content.
How couldn’t we?
Try to read aloud, or at least mouth the words you wrote, when you proofread.
It will help you notice spelling and phrasing errors you would have sometimes missed otherwise. It will considerably improve your essay.
